Hoder Mention January 30, 2012 12:12 PM Subscribe
Think of this as about Hoder. *alas* Feel so futile.
posted by Cranberry at 12:41 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by Cranberry at 12:41 PM on January 30, 2012
I was just talking about Hoder yesterday. I'm unrealistically hoping that they let him go earlier than they said they would.
posted by BrotherCaine at 12:54 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by BrotherCaine at 12:54 PM on January 30, 2012
Cranberry: "Think of this as about Hoder. *alas* Feel so futile."
I'm confused, could someone explain this to me?
This guy writes a blog post about our beloved Hoder.
This guy happens to be Jimmy Wales. Jimmy Wales is apparently a guy a lot of people don't like.
Therefore, Jimmy Wales doesn't really care about Hoder. He is (doing this for attention/wants to look like a good guy/insert your own nefarious motivations here.)
Why can't we take the post at face value? Why do we always have to ascribe negative intentions to the post author and seek out the secret motivations? All this over-analysis makes my head hurt. It makes me think we can't ever trust anyone about anything.
I am not defending Jimmy Wales. I know nothing about him other than he is the founder of Wikipedia and, for various reasons that I haven't paid attention to, a lot of people don't like him.
posted by IndigoRain at 1:19 PM on January 30, 2012 [4 favorites]
I'm confused, could someone explain this to me?
This guy writes a blog post about our beloved Hoder.
This guy happens to be Jimmy Wales. Jimmy Wales is apparently a guy a lot of people don't like.
Therefore, Jimmy Wales doesn't really care about Hoder. He is (doing this for attention/wants to look like a good guy/insert your own nefarious motivations here.)
Why can't we take the post at face value? Why do we always have to ascribe negative intentions to the post author and seek out the secret motivations? All this over-analysis makes my head hurt. It makes me think we can't ever trust anyone about anything.
I am not defending Jimmy Wales. I know nothing about him other than he is the founder of Wikipedia and, for various reasons that I haven't paid attention to, a lot of people don't like him.
posted by IndigoRain at 1:19 PM on January 30, 2012 [4 favorites]
First comment was about Wales. I hope we would all consider the post as being about Hoder. Like/dislike for Wales may be ignored. Not much we can do for Hoder = "alas".
posted by Cranberry at 1:22 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by Cranberry at 1:22 PM on January 30, 2012
Re: Jimmy Wales, the main beef with him is the appearance that he has taken a massive cooperative enterprise among $#!+loads of contributors and made it too much 'all about him'. Because if you were looking for a true 'face of Wikipedia', his is a poor choice.
Re: Hoder, while his ordeal has been many geometric degrees worse than the '1st World' censorship problems of most of us, with the international governmental support for the 'SOPA on steroids' treaty ACTA, and the recent detention and deportation by Homeland Security of two British tourists for making bad jokes on Twitter (along with Twitter's new self-censorship procedure, much-derided but accepted by the EFF as the least bad of the available options), I'm not hopeful that the 'Free World' isn't heading in the same direction at a faster rate than most people realized. Sadly, I can visualize American citizens getting "Hodered" by 2021, sooner if a Gingrich-style demagogue gets into the White House. So get ready for the verbification of "Hoder".
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:35 PM on January 30, 2012
Re: Hoder, while his ordeal has been many geometric degrees worse than the '1st World' censorship problems of most of us, with the international governmental support for the 'SOPA on steroids' treaty ACTA, and the recent detention and deportation by Homeland Security of two British tourists for making bad jokes on Twitter (along with Twitter's new self-censorship procedure, much-derided but accepted by the EFF as the least bad of the available options), I'm not hopeful that the 'Free World' isn't heading in the same direction at a faster rate than most people realized. Sadly, I can visualize American citizens getting "Hodered" by 2021, sooner if a Gingrich-style demagogue gets into the White House. So get ready for the verbification of "Hoder".
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:35 PM on January 30, 2012
I am glad to see word getting out about Hoder from whoever has a big platform, no matter what I think about said person otherwise.
posted by Sidhedevil at 1:38 PM on January 30, 2012 [6 favorites]
posted by Sidhedevil at 1:38 PM on January 30, 2012 [6 favorites]
oneswellfoop: " Sadly, I can visualize American citizens getting "Hodered" by 2021, sooner if a Gingrich-style demagogue gets into the White House. So get ready for the verbification of "Hoder"."
Look, not for nothing, but can we please not engage in hyperbole when speaking about Hoder's situation? Please? There have been reports from both the HRA and Hoder's family that he has actually been beaten and tortured. For speaking out against the Iranian administration, for traveling to Israel and because those corrupt tyrannical fucks wanted to make a political example out of him. Not to mention that he's already been imprisoned for several years, and has 18 years left on a sentence handed down on trumped up charges and unfounded evidence. There are reports that he's been forced to testify against others, no doubt against his will.
That is the reality of his life right now. Typically, Iranian political prisoners who aren't lucky enough to be summarily executed may be tortured, raped, subjected to starvation diets and/or beaten. He deserves better than to be "verbified" for political gain.
posted by zarq at 1:52 PM on January 30, 2012 [33 favorites]
Look, not for nothing, but can we please not engage in hyperbole when speaking about Hoder's situation? Please? There have been reports from both the HRA and Hoder's family that he has actually been beaten and tortured. For speaking out against the Iranian administration, for traveling to Israel and because those corrupt tyrannical fucks wanted to make a political example out of him. Not to mention that he's already been imprisoned for several years, and has 18 years left on a sentence handed down on trumped up charges and unfounded evidence. There are reports that he's been forced to testify against others, no doubt against his will.
That is the reality of his life right now. Typically, Iranian political prisoners who aren't lucky enough to be summarily executed may be tortured, raped, subjected to starvation diets and/or beaten. He deserves better than to be "verbified" for political gain.
posted by zarq at 1:52 PM on January 30, 2012 [33 favorites]
I started that paragraph by clearly stating that "his ordeal has been many geometric degrees worse than the '1st World' censorship problems of most of us", but may I remind you of what 'the good guys' are already doing to 'suspected terrorists', who lack any future date of release which at least MeFi's friend so far has? And the last thread about American prisons and its residents in general? Yes, Iranian imprisonment is worse, but shockingly, not that much worse. The "Twitter joke" case (now on the front page, not by me) really is a "camel's nose into the tent" for this kind of abuse here. By 'verbifying', I mean' maybe too glibly, that we are all beginning to be in danger of becoming like Hoder, and the only thing scarier is what it may take to prevent it.
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:51 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:51 PM on January 30, 2012
There's only been me saying anything about Wales. And that was an acknowledged dick move. The linked blog post, the SOPA blackout and Wikipedia are great, good things.
And my true thoughts are with Hoder and the family of Hoder.
posted by seanyboy at 3:02 PM on January 30, 2012
And my true thoughts are with Hoder and the family of Hoder.
posted by seanyboy at 3:02 PM on January 30, 2012
Fair enough, seanyboy. I was interpreting Cranberry's comment as piling on to the Wales dislike, but he came back to clarify.
posted by IndigoRain at 3:17 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by IndigoRain at 3:17 PM on January 30, 2012
The more people who know about Hoder's situation, the better.
posted by cashman at 6:19 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by cashman at 6:19 PM on January 30, 2012
I hope this publicity has a positive effect on Hoder's situation.
posted by arcticseal at 7:06 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by arcticseal at 7:06 PM on January 30, 2012
Dang, I totally missed this whole thing with Hoder. That MeTa thread about the government's rebuke and the sense that he'd be fine is really depressing now.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 8:55 PM on January 30, 2012
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 8:55 PM on January 30, 2012
I'd heard about Hoder before but hadn't gotten such a full picture; I'm with arcticseal in hoping that this publicity positively affects Hoder's situation.
Re: Jimmy Wales, the main beef with him is the appearance that he has taken a massive cooperative enterprise among $#!+loads of contributors and made it too much 'all about him'. Because if you were looking for a true 'face of Wikipedia', his is a poor choice.
Disclaimer: I work for the Wikimedia Foundation. Jimmy Wales is on the Board of Trustees but that makes him one of ten people who are... my boss's boss's boss's bosses? In any case, I met him once at a conference, don't report to him, generally don't have to care what he says or thinks.
I don't track what Wales says in his private life or in talking to journalists, so I'm no judge of whether he makes Wikipedia & other Wikimedia sites "all about him". But if you're talking about the fundraising banners ("face of Wikipedia") then you may want to know that the fundraising department at the Wikimedia Foundation is definitely branching out beyond Jimmy's face. They've been trying different appeals from contributors and Foundation staffers. (Evidently my colleague Ryan does better without the hat.) You might have seen these during the end-of-2011 fundraising drive.
But donors do also respond to seeing Wales's personal appeal, so the fundraising department didn't discard the option of using a photo of him. Still, that's not about Wales choosing to try to be the face of Wikipedia; that's the fundraising department.
posted by brainwane at 6:46 AM on January 31, 2012 [1 favorite]
Re: Jimmy Wales, the main beef with him is the appearance that he has taken a massive cooperative enterprise among $#!+loads of contributors and made it too much 'all about him'. Because if you were looking for a true 'face of Wikipedia', his is a poor choice.
Disclaimer: I work for the Wikimedia Foundation. Jimmy Wales is on the Board of Trustees but that makes him one of ten people who are... my boss's boss's boss's bosses? In any case, I met him once at a conference, don't report to him, generally don't have to care what he says or thinks.
I don't track what Wales says in his private life or in talking to journalists, so I'm no judge of whether he makes Wikipedia & other Wikimedia sites "all about him". But if you're talking about the fundraising banners ("face of Wikipedia") then you may want to know that the fundraising department at the Wikimedia Foundation is definitely branching out beyond Jimmy's face. They've been trying different appeals from contributors and Foundation staffers. (Evidently my colleague Ryan does better without the hat.) You might have seen these during the end-of-2011 fundraising drive.
But donors do also respond to seeing Wales's personal appeal, so the fundraising department didn't discard the option of using a photo of him. Still, that's not about Wales choosing to try to be the face of Wikipedia; that's the fundraising department.
posted by brainwane at 6:46 AM on January 31, 2012 [1 favorite]
Hoder´s brother is asking people to get active on facebook. It almost makes me want to join up just to help get the word out.
posted by adamvasco at 11:24 AM on February 1, 2012
posted by adamvasco at 11:24 AM on February 1, 2012
Let me give the link to the active "Free Hoder" Facebook page, as the top Google hits are for an older, archived group.
posted by Sidhedevil at 3:31 PM on February 1, 2012
posted by Sidhedevil at 3:31 PM on February 1, 2012
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Not sure why that is. Probably because I'm a bit of a dick. And I haven't improved the world as much as you.
posted by seanyboy at 12:27 PM on January 30, 2012